Independently Speaking By Brent Olson

Pussycat

This morning I was singing “What’s New, Pussycat” to my wife.

That’s a song made famous by Tom Jones, the son of a Welsh coal miner.

I’m part Welsh, which I like to think adds a little something to my performance.

I finished the “wooo, wooo, wooo, woo, woo” part and then trailed off, because that’s all I could remember. I suppose some people would consider that a problem.

“You’re pretty lucky to be married to someone with the Welsh love of music in his bones,” I said.

I don’t remember exactly what my wife replied, but I think she agreed.

To make her even luckier, the Norwegian contribution to my heritage is the boring, practical part that she’d want along if she ever got lost in a blizzard. Put together…quite a package.

To be honest, if I was with her, she probably wouldn’t get lost in a blizzard. I’d suggest that instead of going out in a blizzard we stay home and play cards.

Although, you can never predict just when that Viking blood will surface. During the winter of 68-69, when we were snowed in about 90% of the time, my dad snapped one evening. He put on all the clothes he owned, powered up the 1954 Minneapolis Moline Model Z with the Farmhand loader, and plowed snow for three miles to our neighbor’s house. My mom drove cautiously behind. We had a bite to eat, played a few hands of Whist, and then headed for home. Just to lend a tinge of practicality to the expedition, my dad stopped along the way and helped a neighbor scoop out his driveway so the milk truck could get in. I don’t know if my great-grandfather would have approved of such stubborn impracticality, but he would have been in no position to judge. In 1880, he climbed on a boat with a new wife and new baby and headed for western Minnesota, getting here just in time to shovel record snow amounts off the railroad tracks, by hand.

I don’t believe that any particular ethnic group has a monopoly on any specific talent or virtue. No one, and I mean no one, will recruit me to be part of a men’s choir or to run uphill on cross country skis, no matter where my great-grandparents came from. What I do believe is that feeling you have to live up to an example set by those who’ve come before can add some pressure, but also incentive. I remember reading an interesting article about precedent in the legal system. Judges stand on their heads trying to follow precedents set centuries ago, but they often get something very important completely wrong. Following precedent is not about doing things exactly the way your ancestors did but instead doing things to honor the spirit of their example. So, while I’m not going off to raid England anytime soon, every now and then the stubborn, impractical defiance that is part of my heritage is going to be turned loose, to take me to a place a reasonable person wouldn’t go.

And even though no one is ever going to ask me to join a choir, no one is ever going to keep me from singing to the one I love.

Hold on! I just remembered something else. “Pussycat, pussycat I’ve got flowers and lots of hours, to spend with you…” 

You don’t need to know all the words; you just have to mean the words you sing.

Copyright 2026 Brent Olson